They had no visible means of subsistence.
Extreme want of resources or the means of subsistence;complete poverty.
Malthus believed that population increase would outpace increases in the means of subsistence.
it appears as if a famine, a universal war of devastation had cut off the supply of every means of subsistence;
The average price of wage-labour is the minimum wage, i.e., that quantum of the means of subsistence, which is absolutely requisite in bare existence as a labourer.
The culture of the potato and of food-yielding plants, and the more recent improvements made in agriculture generally, have increased tenfold the productive powers of the human race for the creation of the means of subsistence.
Marius sent back the thirty Louis to his aunt, with a respectful letter, in which he stated that he had sufficient means of subsistence and that he should be able thenceforth to supply all his needs.
